'How to be green? Many people have asked us this important question. It's really very simple and requires no expert knowledge or complex skills. Here's the answer. Consume less. Share more. Enjoy life.' Penny Kemp and Derek Wall

27 Dec 2012

The
tragedy of the commons was a concept put forward by a biologist but Garrett Hardin’s
underlying assumptions, when he developed it, are drawn quite distinctly from
economics. As Elinor Ostrom, who shared a Nobel Prize in economics for
her efforts in challenging the idea of the 'tragedy', noted while Hardin was a
biologist, he shared the assumption of most economists that human beings focus
on personal gain and found cooperation between each other difficult. She noted that Hardin echoed the logic of the distinguished economist, H. Scott Gordon, who had argued
that,‘The fish in the sea are valueless to the fisherman, because there is no
assurance that they will be there for him tomorrow if they are left behind
today (2009: 522).

While economists claim that their
subject is a 'value free' social science, their critics argue that it is based
on particular beliefs that may be open to discussion and interpretation.
These are worth briefly outlining if we are to understand the strengths
and potential weaknesses of such a way of examining commons. The word ‘economics’
is derived from the study of 'oikos' the ancient Greek word for a household.
According to the well-known definition from Professor Lionel Robbins,
economics 'is the science which
studies human behavior as a relationship between given ends and scarce means
which have alternative uses' (1932: 16). Economists focus on concepts
such as choice, resources, rationality and opportunity cost, all of which are
seen as neutral rather than culturally determined and can be applied
universally to different human societies. It is assumed that human being
need to make choice, in fact, the concept of choice is perhaps the essence of
economics. Resources that can be used to produced goods or services can
be used in different ways. We must choose how to use such resources.
Opportunity cost is the notion that when one choice is made, other
choices are given up. The choice or choices not made are the opportunity
cost. There is a strong assumption of 'rationality', within economics,
which stresses that individuals pick the alternatives that provide them with
the most personal gain. Thus Erik
Olin Wright notes, 'economists
assign a privileged place to self-interested rational action in their
micro-level explanations of social phenomenon, and thus give central weight to
the problem of incentives in explaining variations across contexts' (2008:
235).

Implicit
in economics is the notion of methodological individualism, which the political
philosopher Jon Elster has defined in the following terms, 'The elementary unit of social life is the individual human
action. To explain social institutions and social change is to show
how they arise as the result of the actions and interaction of individuals'
(Elster 1989: 13). The interaction of communities is largely ignored by
economists who may find it difficult to understand collective forms of property
and communal action.

Economists argue that individual choice determines
outcomes, for example, if more consumers are prepared to pay for a product,
such increased demand tends to push up the price. In turn price increases
tend to increase profits and motivate producers to provide what consumers
desire. Individual preferences based on the need to gain the maximum
personal benefit drive the economic system. Individuals compete to try
to achieve the greatest personal benefit. The commons, in its varied forms, seems to cut across many of
these assumptions because of the apparent free rider problem. Garrett Hardin and
others critical of common pool property arrangements, argue that in a commons
individuals will take advantage of others, who might conserve a resource, by
using it more intensively. Apparently selfish behavior from a 'free
rider' is perversely rewarded and economists assume that an individual cannot
trust other individuals to conserve shared ground. Thus those who act
ethically and attempt to promote sustainability, say by removing their cattle
from the commons, will see the commons destroyed if others continue to put
their cattle on. The rational individual may even put more cattle on the
commons, exploiting the good action of the supposedly moral individual. Self-interest
pushes ethical action to the margins and, as Garrett
Hardin argued, means that commons must be
eliminated if land is to be sustained ecologically.Thus he
sociologist Erik Olin Wright suggests that for economists 'a
well-maintained commons is a puzzle' and as such 'cries out for an
explanation'. He notes that economists tend to be surprised and confused
that commons might work (Wright 2008: 234).

In contrast, Elinor Ostrom has used assumptions of
broadly rational methodical individualism to suggest that in particular
circumstances commons can be maintained to sustain shared prosperity.
Given particular conditions it is possible for the bounded commons,
particularly on a small scale basis to be preserved. Individuals can join
together and agree to maintain conservation processes, especially where
sanctions can be applied and rules are mutually agreed rather than imposed by
outsiders. The commons, can as Elinor Ostrom argues, in many
circumstances be an economically rational solution to resource management.

Elinor Ostrom might be seen as moving beyond economics in
her largely 'economic' account of commons, certainly there are number of
reasons to see her approach as more sophisticated and flexible than previous
attempts by economists to analyze common pool property.
However, she has been criticized as an 'economic
imperialist' who applies the notions of traditional economics to areas of human
life where they are inappropriate, rather than making economics more cultural,
she might be seen as making social and cultural matters part of the
economic approach of costs, benefits and rational maximizing behavior
(Fine 2010). Ostrom's approach to economics is quite complex
and it is important to understand her theoretical approach developed with her
husband Vincent if we are to assess her description of commons in terms of its
relationship to questions of culture.

The
Ostroms are various described as members of the 'Bloomington School' or 'New
Economic Institutionalists' or as advocates of ‘institutional analysis and development’ (IAD).Bloomington refers to the main Indiana University campus where the
Ostrom's were both based. 'Institutional analysis and development' is the
particular variant of New Economic Institutionalism (NEI) developed by the
Ostroms. NEI is a product of market based economics; it is rooted in the
thought of individuals like Austrian economists such as Friedrich Hayek and Ludwig
von Mises whose assumptions seem much closer to those of Garrett Hardin than
Ostrom (Aligica and
Boettke 2009). Indeed, as we have seen Ludwig von
Mises specifically criticized the notion of common pool property. Elinor Ostrom was even a President of the Public
Choice Society, public choice is an approach to governance which is strongly
critical of the state and advocates market based policies such as privitization.
Rational choice theory is at the heart of public choice theory and NEI,
an approach which seeks to extend economic reasoning, based on costs and
benefits, to sociology to explain human behavior outside areas normally covered
by economics. Elinor and her husband
Vincent did not abandoned the rational choice theory that underpins public
choice but took it in a new direction. NEI
is based on the assumption that rationality is 'bounded' i.e. individuals
follow self-interest but within a particular context shaped by particular
values and circumstances.

Thus
the New Institutionalists explicitly bring in the influence of particular
institutions and varied culture. From their perspective they build on concepts
such as rational choice but apply them in what they see as a messy, complex and
often rather irrational world. From the perspective of much traditional
economics this is boldly radical, from that of disciplines such as sociology
and anthropology it remains rather conservative. Maximizing behavior
continues to drive the models used, rather than alternative goals.

Elinor
Ostrom argues that property rights are not simply 'state' or 'private' and
that, in many circumstances, it is impractical to replace commons with private
property. Through negotiation and learning individuals can often get
together and find ways of managing common property so that, through collective
action, individuals can maximize their net collective benefit. From her
perspective, failure to work out common rules and apply them would lead to the
destruction of the commons, so self-interest is served by establishing
consensual frameworks. Such consensual construction of effective
rules may, according to Ostrom, be difficult to achieve in some circumstances,
but is far from impossible. The approach of unrefined rational
choice theory that suggests that cooperation is virtually impossible, because
of the Prisoners’ ’ dilemma and similar models that invoke the free rider
problem is rejected by Ostrom.

The
Icelandic economist Thrainn Eggertsson sums up the neo-institutional approach
to commons noting that commons are often efficient economically but their
relative benefits depend on social and political factors as well as pure economic
considerations(1993:20).

This is approach is a form of
political economy, in that political assumptions and institutions are seen as
shaping economic decision making. The rules depend on the institutions
constructed and institutional design is a political act. Even at the
level of a Japanese village or indigenous territory in the Ecuadorian Amazon,
the politics of rulemaking and negotiation is apparent. This approach is
based on the development of particular cultures, which are refined, transmitted
from generation to generation and evolve over time. Such cultural
foundations of an economic system are usually ignored by economists but are of
vital importance to both Ostroms and to other institutional economists.

23 Dec 2012

FYI I found the SWP on the whole a positive group to work with over the last couple of years, particularly around ecology and climate change. However I was interested to see this call for democratisation. comments welcome

Statement of SWP Democratic Opposition
Four comrades have been expelled for forming a ‘secret faction’ during the discussions prior toSWP conference. The expelled members had been legitimately concerned about the handling ofvery serious allegations directed at a CC member and the way that this was being handled by theorganisation and had discussed about what this represented and how comrades could ensure thematter was dealt with properly.
There had been some discussion about whether to declare a faction or not. Some comrades, out ofconcern for how these matters had been dealt with previously, were in favour of doing so - but othercomrades were worried that this might be premature or even disloyal. It is for having this discussionand sharing these concerns that the comrades have been expelled.
Importantly, the accusation of ‘secret faction’ was made against those concerned about declaringone whilst those in favour of declaring one have been referred to as ‘honest’ in a number of reportbacks from the CC to affected local branches, implying that those expelled were ‘dishonest’. Weunreservedly reject this description as slander against the four excellent and valuable comrades whohave been expelled.
We feel that this incident raises serious questions about democracy in the SWP in general and aboutthe coming conference in particular. First of all, it cannot be right that a discussion about whether toform a faction is used as evidence of a ‘secret faction’ when it is in the general discussions of the pre-conference period. On a basic level, if we cannot have discussions about whether to form a faction ornot, then, in reality, factions are de-facto impossible to organise and the right to form them is purelynotional.
Secondly, it is not the case that this is the first, or even the most significant case of comradesdiscussing meeting before conference to discuss the possibility of a factional organisation that neverended up being formed.
In the run-up to the highly contested 2009 conference, a number of unofficial meetings between SWPmembers occurred, mainly in pubs and on one occasion after a party council, of members concernedabout the developing crisis following the botched electoral strategy in 2008. The pace of events meantthat these meetings, which were certainly planned in advance, never coalesced into a named faction,but no members were disciplined for involvement, certainly not the two people who serve on the CCsince who had participated. The unofficial pre-conference meet-ups of 2008 were followed in Summer2009 by an even more unorthodox grouping: a petition, written and organised entirely in secret andoutside pre-conference season and mainly signed by party staff, to oust the then-editor of SocialistWorker. Again, no disciplinary procedure was employed – particularly not against the party workerwho organised this factional group, who is now in the CC. These incidents, and doubtless others,show that any claim that the rules regarding factions are not, and have never been, implemented witha degree of judgement taking into account prevailing circumstances are wholly false.
There should not be an atmosphere of fear and intimidation in the run up to conference. Leninismrequires discipline to confront the class enemy – not to prevent debate amongst our own comrades.We believe that these malicious expulsions must be revoked immediately and that the CC mustretract its accusations against the four people.
We are also deeply concerned about the impact of all this on our reputation inside the movement. It islittle short of incredible that if the expulsions are not rescinded, comrades are going to be expected todefend the expulsion of four comrades (including one woman) simply for discussing concerns aboutthe handling of very serious allegations in their own organisation.
Our feeling is that this is an untenable situation and will have an appalling impact on the morale ofmembers and our ability to build in today's movement. We think that one of the key lessons of thedemocracy commission was that no comrade should be treated as indispensable. We make nojudgement of guilt or innocence of the comrade concerned but note that any other comrade facingallegations of this type with such frequency would be suspended until such time as the allegationswere resolved. It is disturbing that the comrade concerned did not voluntarily step down when itbecame clear that the allegations, whether justified or not, had the potential to seriously damage the
organisation. An attitude which treats individuals as indispensable and sacrifices the interests of themembership for them has nothing to with Leninism and more closely resembles the self-interestedbehaviour of reformist bureaucracies.
Importantly it is not just our reputation at stake here but the health of our own tradition. In response tothe expulsions some comrades have repeated the language of some of Galloway's defenders. Therehave been complaints about 'liberal feminism' and even belief-beggaring accusations that some of thecomrades expelled have been MI5 agents, or acting on behalf of Chris Bambery's organisation. Whilstthe CC cannot be held directly responsible for such idiocy it is a warning of the kind of ideologicaldegeneration possible when administrative coercion replaces the norms of debate in socialistorganisation.
We are aware that serious concerns have already been expressed by those involved in the disputescommittee case around this matter, as raised at a recent NC meeting, and that space has been setaside to discuss the way the organisation has mishandled the allegations. This is a positivedevelopment, but we believe that beyond the direct issue of the DC there are now equally seriousquestions about the condition of the SWP that makes a faction necessary if we are not to be expelledfor expressing our concerns.
We propose that three things are necessary to prevent further damage to the good name of our Party:The expelled comrades deserve a full and frank apology from the CC and the expulsions must bedeclared null and void.Conference must re-affirm that comrades have full rights to conduct any and every kind of discussionin the pre-conference period. This should include raising questions of whether such freedom oughtnot to be extended beyond the pre-conference period.The dispute concerning a member of the CC highlighted above must be re-examined, and the CCmember concerned must be suspended from all Party activity and cannot work full time for the Partyor in the name of the Party until all the allegations against him have been settled satisfactorily.
In addition to these statements, we are asking comrades to support the motions raised on thequestion of party democracy at conference. In our view, the conduct of the CC regarding boththe expulsions, and the disputes committee referred to above, come as a result of structures andperspectives that restrict internal democracy and discussion.
We are aware that some comrades may share our concerns regarding the expulsions and/or thisdisputes committee investigation, but reject our conclusions regarding party democracy. We hope topersuade them of our position on this; but even if we cannot accomplish this, we would still ask you tovote for the reinstatement of the four comrades who have been expelled.
[Here was the list of declaration signatories.]
If you are an SWP member, you agree with us and would like to join the Democratic Opposition in the run upto 2013 Party Conference, please email democratic.opposition@gmail.com. The Democratic Opposition is atemporary faction, in line with Party rules, and will dissolve itself after Conference closes.

21 Dec 2012

HELP NEEDED NOW TO DEFEND THE TREES! Early morning reports on the
ground suggest contractors are going to attempt to fell trees at Adams
Farm (TN33 9AY). This is one of the last remaining areas with
significant number of large trees on the route of the road.
Security and police reported at the top of the access track, and we
believe the footpath from Crowhurst playing field car park has been
closed. Other more imaginative routes in to Adams Farm exist:
cross-country, from the Upper Wilting Farm direction, even across the
partially flooded valley from the Bexhill end.
Note also a significant pocket of trees at risk located near Decoy
Pond, half way between Adams Farm and Upper Wilting Farm. To receive
info and action reports throughout the day text 07926 423033.

20 Dec 2012

In
the early medieval period nomadic herders travelled across huge territories
freely however access to land over time, while remaining communal became more formalized
and restricted. Genghis Khan (1162?-1227) granted land to his allies to
cement his political and military power. This allowed a Mongolian
nobility to control communal pastureland and they were able to tax herders.
Thus as in England, an essentially feudal system was introduced, with a
monarch, granting land to an elite who were rewarded for their loyalty and
extracted wealth from the wider population. The reintroduction of
Buddhism in 1586 was another important development. As in England the
church was a major owner of land and an important political and economic power.
The formalization of land rights under the Buddhist authority and the
system of patronage established by Genghis Khan accelerated with the Manchu
Qing dynasty occupation of Mongolia in 1691.The occupiers drew up a legal code and rigidly divided up the land,
eventually creating a hundred military territories known as khoshuun.Herders
who had previously moved from one territory to another had to stick to the
territory within which they were born, showing allegiance to the ruler of such
territory (Fernandez-Gimenez 2006: 31).

After
Manchu rule ended their system of formal property rights continued however
transhumance with herders moving their animals seasonally was maintained.Yet herders had to remain in the same khoshuun
rather than ranging where they
liked throughout Mongolian territory. Gradually some privately
control campsites emerged but communal and nomadic ways of life continued.
The creation of a 20th century Mongolian Republic, at least briefly, led
to a return to more flexible and locally controlled property ownership as
in 1925 feudal and religious structures were abolished. The 20th
century saw the introduction of soviet style collectivism that peaked in 1959
with 99% of herders cemented into this system of state central control of
agriculture.Once again the freedom of
herders was restricted by a governing power.With the collapse of the Soviet Union, a market
orientated Mongolian Republic emerged which saw attempts to privatize land
holdings. In the 21st century a greater understanding of the benefits of
communal herding may be re-emerging. Yet with economic and political
change in Mongolia communing has diminished.While commons still exist and nomadic herding continues the territory
used by herders has shrank, their control over their animals has been reduced, while
informal regulation has been increasingly replaced by formal legal control (Fernandez-Gimenez
2006: 33).

Mongolia shows also that commons while difficult to
eliminate totally or control centrally are affected by external political
events.Genghis Khan, Tibetan Buddhism,
Chinese invasion, the Soviet experience and market based policies encouraged by
bodies such as the World Bank have all shaped the commons, nonetheless despite formalization
and erosion the Mongolian pastoral commons remains. The anthropologist David Sneath (2007)
has stressed the libertarian nature of Mongolian society, arguing that central
control has remained relatively weak with herders enjoying a large measure of
independence throughout many centuries. It is interesting to note that intercommoning by
nomadic people is still a feature of life in Mongolia but was eliminated in England
perhaps as early as the medieval period.

David Sneath (2000) has also suggested that
religious values that predate Buddhism influenced attitudes to land in Mongolia
during much of its history. Herders believed that spirits known
as gazariinezed were the owners of the land rather than humans.
These spirits were treated as high dignitaries and were given offerings
in ceremonies known as oboo. Typically, the tsagaanluu or white dragon
had to be presented with white food such as dairy products and rice. Such
ceremonies were followed by sporting festivals that included wrestling
contests. Today communal use remains a hot political topic with the land
issue differentiating new liberal parties in Mongolia who seek land privatization
and more traditional and left opponents who oppose this. In Chinese
controlled Inner Mongolia, mining is displacing herders and indigenous people
causing conflict. The conflict between communal agricultural use of land
or hunting and the needs of high growth economies to extract metals, minerals
and fossil fuels is played out in many parts of the world.

11 Dec 2012

Direct action by UK Uncut has been brilliantly effective at putting the spotlight on tax-evading corporations.

The group's recent occupation of Starbucks branches up and down Britain has embarrassed the company into admitting that it pays virtually no tax and even volunteering a token sum.

Of course, the Con-Dems love corporations. Chancellor George Osborne's Autumn Statement included a promise to cut corporation tax even further.

So drawing attention to rampant tax avoidance exposes the coalition's disastrous austerity agenda - it's increasingly clear that if large companies paid their tax bills we could halt the cuts and find new ways of meeting our country's needs, such as expanding the NHS, raising pensions and building new homes.

Raising taxes from fat-cat firms is important, but there hasn't been much discussion of the deeper cause of economic pain and widening inequality.

Politicians, think tanks and the media tend to ignore the issue of property ownership.

Yet without questioning how we own property we will tend only to look at the symptoms of inequality, not its fundamental causes.

Property ownership means owning the sources of wealth in any society. From home ownership to the ownership of land and shares, it largely determines who is rich and who is poor.

If you own access to economically productive resources, the means of creating wealth, you won't have a problem getting by.

And the ownership of property is increasingly concentrated in the hands of a smaller and smaller minority - this is key to the growth of inequality both in Britain and worldwide.

Our country has had some of the most unequal patterns of land ownership in the world since 1066.

Adescendant of a Viking raider - William of Normandy - invaded via Sussex and took all the land in England, then parcelled it out to his trusted allies.

The existing population was dispossessed and, if we're honest, still is - from the Duke of Westminster's properties in central London to the huge royal estates, land ownership is dominated by a powerful minority.

Land is still a big issue in much of the world, as land grabs in Africa and elsewhere show - local people find their resources stolen by a greedy few almost every day.

But it's no longer the key source of wealth in Britain.

Wealth is derived from our collective labour and economic resources are increasingly owned by shareholders.

Shares too tend to concentrate in a few hands, with a handful of big shareholders controlling most corporations.

Con-Dem ideology and conventional economics stress that hard work is the source of wealth.

In a real sense it is, but that doesn't mean the wealth ends up where the hard work was done. Share ownership provides dividends without the need to get one's hands dirty with production.

The rich rarely sweat and while their ancestors on occasion may have done so, the motto originally from the French novelist Honore de Balzac that introduces the great US novel The Godfather still generally holds: Behind every great fortune, there is a great crime.

Neoliberalism is driving further the concentration of property ownership.

The austerity agenda involves countries across the world taking resources - whether those are library buildings, roads, land or radio spectrums - that are publicly owned and selling them off.

The cheap sale of assets transforms public ownership into ownership by shareholders, and the resources controlled by shareholders have to be used not to benefit communities but to provide the most short-term profit.

Thus control of the economy passes more and more into the hands of a minority. Short-term cash considerations lead to environmental damage. And politics becomes more and more distorted by the whims of an elite.

For democracy to function a diverse media is necessary - access to information shapes our ability as voters to make meaningful choices. As media ownership, like everything else, becomes dominated by a minority, groups like Rupert Murdoch's News International gain more and more power over events.

It's a never-ending cycle - control of property gives the ability to raise more cash from financial institutions which can then be used to control yet more property.

Centralisation of property ownership leads to falling incomes for the majority of us and is accelerated by processes of liberalisation.

Ultimately property ownership is a bit like society's DNA. Different forms of property rights give rise to different futures.

That's why we need to think creatively about property. It's interesting that the often far from forward-looking Romans didn't simply have "private" and "state" property but more than six different kinds of property, including community ownership and even ownership by the gods.

We might not wish to give the likes of Zeus a controlling stake in resources, but is it any less rational to sell control of our NHS or our roads to corporations based in Texas or Bavaria?

There are all sorts of alternative options on the table. Radical US economist John R Commons developed the concept of a "bundle" of property rights - instead of having an exclusive right to own and sell property on an individual basis, different users might have different rights to property in terms of access for productive use.

It would build on structures such as common land, of which incidentally there is over 400,000 acres in England and Wales. This land is provately owned but gives "commoners" a range of rights from grazing cattle to flying kites.

We need to put democratic ownership back on the agenda. Whether it's establishing a real democratic input into how existing public property is used, so it isn't controlled by distant bureaucrats, or it's giving workers control of companies, property needs to be owned and enjoyed by more of us.

The aspiration for democratic politics was dismissed as "mob rule" and rejected as utopian extremism before the 1789 French revolution.

Today the aspiration for democratic ownership is seen as so extreme that it is rarely even articulated.

But from Wikipedia to the co-operative movement to communal councils in Venezuela, the idea that we can extend ownership from the few to the many is slowly emerging.

Derek Wall is international co-ordinator for the Green Party of England and Wales.

9 Dec 2012

Derek WallInternational Coordinator of the Green Party of England and Wales, authorThe Wealth of CommonsEdited by David Bollier and Silke HelfrichLevellers Presshttp://bit.ly/UTst79
The popularity of collective, ecologically-responsible ownership is growing . From Venezuela's creation of 21st century socialism based on communal councils to the late great Professor Elinor Ostrom's Nobel Prize in economics, commons are becoming better known.This is a superb collection of 73 short essays on the commons, covering very diverse and exciting perspectives. The essay on the connection between the indigenous idea of buen vivar (good living) is especially good. Massimo de Angelis warns how the commons can be co-opted by capitalism and Peter Linebaugh links commons to the work of Marxist historians like the great English ecosocialist E.P. Thompson.David Bollier had the book printed at his local left and community printers in Amherst, Massachutes and you can order a copy via http://www.wealthofthecommons.org/.However, being about the value of free, as in free beer, he and Silke will be putting the whole book on the web for free in the future. This is my favourite green left themed book of 2012. Commons is about property and, for me, whether it is indigenous land or fighting the enclosure of the web from corporations, property is about class struggle.

7 Dec 2012

Save Heatherwood Hospital | Public March | December 8th

The Save Heatherwood Hospital campaign is planning a march up Ascot High Street to Heatherwood Hopsital, on Saturday December 8th. Assemble 11.30am in Car Park 6, at the bottom of Ascot High St, next to the Jaguar showroom. A presentation of a 23,000 signature petitions to seniorPrimary Care Trust representative, calling for retention of hospital and full services :an historic occasion is planned!

13 Nov 2012

good resolution drafted by the Initiative for Catalonia Greens and passed over the weekend, Greens need to be fighting austerity!Resolution adopted as amended at the EGP Athens Council, November 2012

GREENS IN EUROPE JOIN THE ACTION DAY AGAINST AUSTERITY – NOVEMBER 14th

The European Green Party welcomes the coordination and cooperation between different Trade Unions around the different actions on the 14th of November. We welcome that the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC) is calling for a European Day of Action and Solidarity in favour of employment and solidarity, and against austerity. We have long stood for and continued to advocate solidarity, solidity and sustainability. The Greens commit to joining this mobilization with workers and social movements, calling for real change in current economic policies.

After five years of deep economic, financial and ecological crisis, it is time to say with one single European voice that we need a radical change. Unbalanced policies on social cuts and increases in regressive taxation are just creating poverty, social exclusion and youth unemployment. Europe is entering a scenario of economic stagnation in 2013, with a dramatic rise of poverty and unemployment. Cuts in wages and social protection endanger the European social model, worsening imbalances and fostering injustice.In fact austerity at any cost makes no economic sense; the existence of automatic stabilizers (such as wage indexation, social security, unemployment benefit) has softened the effects of the crisis and we need them, as well as a green investment strategy, to exit the crisis.

The Action Day on 14 November will include several types of actions: strikes, demonstrations, rallies and debates to raise awareness. We support the recent strike in Greece and we join the call to take part in the demonstrations and the general strike in Spain, Portugal, Italy, and perhaps Malta and Cyprus. We call on all Green activists to take part in their country’s demonstrations or with the ETUC in front of the headquarters of the European Commission in Brussels.

A Green Europe needs strong social movements. Greens in Europe thus join the Action Day against austerity. This 14th of November, we will reclaim the streets to change our future.